


relative direction

by lagaudiere



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-03
Packaged: 2018-08-19 06:08:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8193172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lagaudiere/pseuds/lagaudiere
Summary: It wasn't really him, though, he reminds himself. That was another James Kirk, one who grew up with a father, who never doubted his path in life, who was probably memorizing physics textbooks and The Art of War while Jim was busy skipping class and looking for something that would make his life feel less real. He’d lost any chance of being that person long before he ever met Spock. So maybe he's just jealous of himself. (From Star Trek 2009 to post-Star Trek Beyond, a gradual progression)





	

"Checkmate?" Jim says hopefully. 

Spock shakes his head and maneuvers his king out of what had looked like dire straits. "I'm afraid not, captain," he says.

Chess is one of the things Jim remembers; not the moves or the strategies, unfortunately, but that they played together. He was good at it, too, good enough to win sometimes. So he'd asked Spock if he knew how to play, and Spock, who said he'd picked it up at the academy, is teaching him. 

Jim is a natural, as he'd pretty much expected to be. It's easy, once you understand the movements of the pieces and the typical mistakes of an opponent, memorize the patterns and tactics. He can beat pretty much anyone on the Enterprise now - but not Spock. Not yet. 

Jim stares down the board, but if Spock has an endgame strategy, it isn't clear. He slides one of his bishops out of the reach of Spock's pawns, and immediately sees a glimmer of triumph in his opponent's eyes - that's exactly what he'd wanted. 

"Checkmate," Spock says, executing his final move. "An admirable game, however. You are improving." 

Accepting his defeat, Jim knocks over his own king. "Another round, then?" he says. 

"I should return to the supervision of the science department, captain," Spock says. 

Fighting off disappointment, Jim smiles and collects the rest of his pieces from the board. "One of these days I'll get it," he says, and his eyes linger on Spock's remaining chess pieces, arranged in a perfect no-win scenario. 

***

Jim remembers, and that's the difficult thing. 

It's Spock's fault, really; the other Spock, at least. As soon as their minds met each other, Jim had known, and when he thinks about it he might have been lost at that moment; everything else might have been too late. 

Ambassador Spock hadn't meant for him to understand all of it. He'd tried to simply show him a friendship, a dual career that has spanned decades and changed the federation's history. But it hasn't been that simple, and the emotions bled together, into everything else, into the way they had hurt and repaired and loved. Ambassador Spock could not think of Admiral Kirk without thinking of a thousand memories, distant but bright and vivid, kept close, cherished; and behind every one of them the feeling of terrible loss. 

It was the feeling of being in love, and Jim knew as soon as he felt it that he had never felt it before. He could never look at Spock again without knowing that. 

He'd resisted it at first. It wasn't real, he told himself, it was the echo of what had happened between two people who had their genes but not their lives. In this world, there was no reason to feel the same. 

 

Except that he couldn't stop thinking about it; couldn't stop looking. 

Jim had noticed already that he was attractive, of course, but only in a causal way, overridden by overwhelming annoyance. Afterwards, he just keeps noticing. 

The more you look at him, the more there is to notice. 

And once they get past the initial awkwardness, to put it mildly, well - Jim thinks they could work. As coworkers at least, maybe friends. There's something to what Ambassador Spock said. They make each other better. 

But none of that adds up to a meaningful relationship, or it shouldn’t. Somehow the sum of it feels greater than its parts. 

If Spock were someone else, Jim would ask for what he wants, regardless of his relationship or anything else. He would have to try. 

But Spock isn't someone else, and if they have some kind of fragile friendship, it's too important to break. 

They're fighting about some diplomatic mission when Jim realizes it's inescapable. 

Jim vaguely remembers the broader points later; one planet full of belligerent aliens has invaded another one and is insisting the reason is that their own planet is on the verge of exploding. The Enterprise, as usual, has been sent to sort it out. 

“Their planet obviously isn't going to explode,” Jim says impatiently, leafing through the mission brief. “There's no evidence of it. We tell them to get back to their own planet and stop stealing these people’s natural resources.” 

Spock immediately gives him a look of deep disapproval. “Captain, I believe you are reacting emotionally to the practice of colonialism.” 

Jim tries to resist rolling his eyes. “Well, it's not exactly great, Spock. We humans frown on it.” 

“If I may offer an alternative suggestion, the Plejarans are exceptionally well-suited to life in a volcanic environment. We may avoid conflict by offering them resettlement on a world that is uninhabitable to most other species.” 

“Tell me you don't actually think this planet is going to explode.” 

Spock raises an eyebrow. “Naturally, no,” he says. “However, I doubt that you will be able to successfully persuade them otherwise.” 

There's something about that attitude that Jim, despite his best efforts, can't stand. 

“Why do you do this?” he says. “Do you ever consider that maybe, sometimes, I might know what I'm doing?” 

Spock looks up at him, affronted. 

“Captain, you have never accepted the limitations many humans assume are true of my species,” he says. “I am attempting to do the same for you.” 

The anger drains suddenly out of his body completely, and it's replaced with something warm and bright, familiar and unfamiliar at once. He can hear the sincerity in Spock’s voice, and he knows he wouldn't give this up. Wherever it comes from, it's under his skin now. 

They use Spock’s diplomacy plan, and it works perfectly.

After that he just told himself it was impossible. That was much easier to believe. 

***  
Jim likes Christine Chapel. She's brilliant - already a registered nurse and halfway through Starfleet Academy’s medical program. She wears her long blonde hair in a tight bun at the back of her neck, and she's objectively beautiful. 

It's obvious that she likes him as soon as she transfers to the ship and starts spending lunch hours with him and Bones. 

It's easy to get her attention, and he likes that, or he used to like that. He's not sure, because there's always something strangely unfulfilling about it, even as he really does enjoy her company. 

Sometimes if he looks a little distant, she leans close to him, puts a hand on his arm, and says “Are you alright?” Her eyes will brim with that focused concern that seems almost self-serving, that deep desire to know what's really wrong. 

He's used to the type. The type of person who is looking who someone flawed to fix. It's his type, really; it's half the reason he used to hang around so many medical students at the academy. 

“I'm fine,” Jim usually says, because it's easier. 

He takes her out on shore leave, once, because it's easy, and they have a nice time, talking over dinner, drinking a few glasses of wine. 

They walk back to the hotel where the crew is staying together, and the mood in the air is obvious - their shoulders keep bumping together and she sneaks shy smiles at him from beneath her eyelashes. 

It feels strangely empty, but that's not so different from the way it used to feel, is it? Nothing has changed. 

“Well,” she says when they arrive at her door, “I guess this is me,” and almost without hesitation she leans in to kiss him. 

He kisses her back, or he means to, and then there's a flash of memory. 

He gets those sometimes; he thinks it's because they were somewhere in Ambassador Spock’s subconscious, and now they're somewhere in his. 

He's remembering Christine Chapel, a version of her, and she's kissing Spock. The circumstances are vague and strange: they're on an alien planet, being watched, he thinks, maybe being commanded. But he knows Spock isn't kissing this Chapel because he wants to, he didn't choose this, and it feels wrong and alien, it feels almost disloyal to be doing this when he wants - when he really wants - 

Jim breaks away from Christine abruptly. 

Disloyal. That's exactly how it feels. God, this isn't fair. 

He can’t do this. 

“Jim, are you alright?” Christine says, and he realizes that his sudden freakout must be obvious on his face. He runs a hand through his hair and tries to appear normal. 

“Did I do something wrong?” she asks. 

“No, no,” he says hastily. “I just shouldn't be doing this.” 

Her eyes narrow in suspicion. “There's nothing improper about it. Leonard is my supervisor, not you.” 

Jim laughs. “Yeah, and if you ask him, he’d tell you I'm not the guy for you.” 

The expression on her face is more confusion than anything, but he knows it's going to be hard to look her in the eye back on the ship. This is what he does, though. It shouldn't surprise anyone. He's Jim Kirk, and he ruins relationships. 

Even if he does usually get at least a few hours further into them. 

When McCoy blames Jim for the loss of his best nurse, Jim lets him make the obvious assumption. 

*** 

Jim hates weddings. Or at least, weddings seem like something he would hate. Admittedly, the last one he attended was his brother's, which was witnessed by himself and a handle of the bride's family and friends in an Iowa courthouse. The groom's parents were not invited. 

Sulu's wedding isn't like that. He said, when he invited the crew, that it was going to be small, a family thing, but his definition of "small" is apparently different from Jim's, because the event is attended by what seems like hundreds of Sulu and Ben's family members, who all want to hear Jim's version of the story about leaving the parking brake on. 

After a few hours of that, and the discovery that Bones is more interested in engaging someone's uncle in a vicious debate about the merits of chiropractics than commiserating, Jim finds the only person who looks as out of place as he feels, sitting by himself with an untouched glass of champagne. 

"So not dancing?" Jim says. 

"Dancing is hardly a logical pursuit," Spock says, but there's a hint of irony in it, and Jim grins at that. 

"Keeping your girlfriend happy is, I'd think." 

Spock nods at the dance floor, and Jim can make out Uhura whirling by, laughing. "Ms. Marcus is a more engaging dancing partner than myself," he says, entirely inscrutable. 

That is probably Jim's cue to drop it.

"Weddings are different on Vulcan, I'm sure," he says. 

Spock nods. 

"Completely. We are betrothed at a young age to a spouse chosen by our parents. The actual marriage is a ceremonial formality." Spock quirks an eyebrow in what Jim thinks is disdain. "The only purposes served are reproduction and the preservation of the social order." 

"You know, sometimes I think that if Vulcans hadn't been a founding member of the Federation, we would never have let them join. No offense." 

"None taken," Spock says drily. "My parents' marriage was not seen as legitimate by many Vulcans either." 

Jim's eyes find Sulu and Ben on the dance floor again; it's a slower song now, and they're gazing at each other as if no one else in the room exists. "It's not really the same, is it," he says, mostly to himself. 

"No," Spock concedes. "I suppose not." 

Jim reaches for Spock's glass of champagne and takes a long drink before he can think too much about discussing this topic. 

He can understand the appeal, he thinks, with dismay. Of all of it. 

You're a lost cause, Jim Kirk, he tells himself. You really are. 

Champagne glass in hand, he walks back into the crowd to find Bones and pry him away from medical debates. At least he can spare himself the indignity of leaving a wedding alone.  
***

He watches Spock, too often. More or less all the time. 

The good thing about that is that it doesn't require any effort on his part, and therefore he doesn't have to think very hard about it. 

Spock is always just there, in his peripheral vision. He's standing at his science station on the bridge, or beside the captain’s chair lecturing Jim on exactly what he’s doing wrong today, or showing up at Jim’s cabin door uninvited because he wants to play chess or have an hours-long conversation about earth philosophy. 

When Jim beams down on a mission, Spock usually insists on accompanying him, and Jim has to remind himself to focus on the mission and not on Spock’s poorly hidden love of discovering new species of small, furry animals - or worse, his elegance in a fight. 

He's so hard to look away from. 

It's more than just physical admiration, although of course it's that too - he's only human, unfortunately. 

Spock’s face is, when you start to notice it, just as expressive as anyone else’s. The key is to look hard enough to notice how quickly those expressions cross his face, to catch those slight moments before he stifles what he’s feeling and they disappear. 

Then there are the tiny things he does show, the many quirks of his eyebrows and slight twists of his lips that make up his own nonverbal language. Jim's trying to learn them all, and maybe he'll get good enough to know everything that Spock is really saying. 

It's a discipline that Jim thinks he could become a master in, memorizing him. 

Spock is, well, fascinating. 

He watches him when he's with Uhura, and the two of them are nearly always together. But it's hard to tell anything about their relationship from the way they behave together in front of the rest of the crew. They barely touch, and mostly talk about professional topics in their matching calm, measured tones. 

Still, he watches. There's something between them that he’ll never understand, and Jim has no right to be jealous. He's never known Spock when he wasn't in a relationship. He's the outsider, the one inserting himself into something he has no role in. 

But he can't pretend it's nothing, that imprint that Ambassador Spock left on his mind. He can't forget what he knows - that in some other time, in some other circumstances, Spock could have loved him. 

It wasn't really him, though, he reminds himself. That was another James Kirk, one who grew up with a father, who never doubted his path in life, who was probably memorizing physics textbooks and The Art of War while Jim was busy skipping class and looking for something that would make his life feel less real. 

He’d lost any chance of being that person long before he ever met Spock. 

So maybe he's just jealous of himself. 

*** 

 

Dying is harder than Jim ever thought it would be. 

He'd been trying to for so long, as long as he can remember, really. There was a time when he thought he wouldn't make it to twenty, that if it wasn't a car crash it would be a pill he'd forgotten to take or taken too many of. And he would have said that he didn't just expect it, he accepted it. It would be setting the scales right, in a way. Burn bright, go out quick. 

No one ever told him it would feel like this. 

His life doesn't flash before his eyes. Not his past, anyway. If anything, his semiconscious, desperate brain provides him with a fast-forward. 

 

Never went to Risa, he’d always wanted to do that. Never met Sam’s son or Bones’ daughter - never told his mother or Sam or Bones he was sorry for everything he’d put them through. Never told Spock - never - 

Spock. 

He's there, and suddenly that's the only thing that's real, because he doesn't know how to feel, if he hates for Spock to see this - he should hate it - or if he's grateful, horribly, selfishly grateful for every last moment when he thought he’d run out of time, used up everything he’d ever have. 

He reaches out but then he remembers, there's glasses between them - can't touch him, shouldn't touch him. He leaves his hand there and then Spock’s is pressed against the other side of the glass, and that's almost touching. That's almost something. 

“How's our ship?” he asks. 

“Out of danger.” 

“Good...” Jim manages, slumping against the glass. 

Spock's voice is urgent. “You saved the crew.” 

Good. Only thing that matters, only the crew, and this… God, he wishes he could touch Spock’s hand. “You used what he wanted against him. That's a nice move.” 

“It is what you would have done,” Spock says, and maybe Jim has taught him something after all. 

“And this… it was what you would have done. It was only logical.” He knows that, knows it for sure, because it's echoing in his mind, the memory of hands pressed up against glasses, of the needs of the many and the needs of the one. He wishes it helped.

“I'm scared, Spock,” he says, and he can hear his voice breaking. “Help me not be. How do you choose not to feel?” 

Spock's crying, he realizes then, and that's all wrong. He's not supposed to make Spock cry. Never wanted that. “I do not know,” he says. “Right now, I am failing,” 

Never and always, Jim thinks - one of those phrases that gets stuck in his head although he knows they didn't originate there. Touching and touched. 

If only there wasn't a panel of glass between them, he could touch Spock’s hand, and he could tell him how this feels. 

And he could touch Spock’s hand, and that wouldn't be such a bad way to die. 

There's a heavy pain in his chest, and it's getting hard to breathe. He's running out of time. 

“I want you to know why I couldn't let you die,” he says, because suddenly it feels urgent, like he can't like let go without saying this. “Why I went back for you.” 

He isn't expecting Spock to answer, but he does immediately. “Because you are my friend,” he says. 

Jim watches his trying to hold back his tears, and “friend” is enough. This is enough. 

It feels right, he thinks, that Spock is the last face he’s going to see.  
***

The details of what happens afterwards are fuzzy, in his own mind, which is probably good because when Jim does try to think about them, he has the feeling that he shouldn't. But he doesn't die. Not permanently. 

It becomes a kind of ship-wide legend among the crew, what Commander Spock did when he thought the captain was dead. Somehow, the more Jim hears the story retold, the stranger it seems that it really is true. That Spock had felt that. That Spock had cared; cared more, maybe, than he cared about his own death, which he’d faced without hesitation and without tears. 

Things are supposed to be different, after that. With anyone else, they would be different. Spock, of course, is wholly successful in pretending that nothing has changed. 

If they're friends, apparently this is the kind of friends they're going to be, nervously stepping around the subject like they don't know each other any better than they did on the first day they met, like it meant nothing to die and kill for each other. 

Friends isn't the word at all, and he wonders if Spock knows that. 

At some point, Jim expects him to say something, to acknowledge what had happened between them, but he never does. Days turn into weeks and then to months. Wherever it is that Spock buries his emotions, Jim figures this one is at the bottom of the pile. 

Somethings it feels like the strangest part of it is that he’d ever seen Spock cry. 

Some six months after Khan, they beam down with McCoy and a handful of other crew members for a routine check on the technological progress of a recent first contact species. It's a beautiful, tropical planet - Chekov can't stop referring to it as “paradise”, although that might be more for the benefit of the girl from security he’s flirting with. 

“Well, if this is the Garden of Eden, everyone remember not to eat any of the fruit,” Bones says. 

“Typical Southern -” Jim starts to reply, but before he can finish, Spock throws himself in front of him in a defensive posture and reaches for him phaser. 

Jim looks frantically around for the threat. “What the-” 

Immediately in front of them, a local plant explodes, coughing a deluge of pollen in Spock’s general direction. 

Jim bursts into laughter. 

“My sensors detected a disturbance,” Spock says, offended. “Knowing your susceptibility to allergies, I logically decided -” 

“Logically?” Bones interrupts. “I saw your face, Mr. Spock - I’d call that panicking.” 

Spock looks deeply uncomfortable. “The captain could have been in danger,” he says quietly. 

“But we are on an alien planet,” Chekov points out. “It could have been poisonous to any of us.” 

Jim’s starting to feel like this conversation is getting out of hand, but Spock turns and addresses him directly. 

“By any objective measure,” Spock says, “your life is more valuable than mine.” 

Jim laughs. “With everything that Starfleet has invested in you? Yeah, right.” 

Spock folds his arms across his chest and looks resentful. “You are incorrect. As the captain of the Enterprise, I suggest that you place a higher value on your own life.” 

Jim’s momentarily speechless, trying to summon something to say in his own defense, but then he realizes how guarded Spock’s posture is, his shoulders hunched and face turned away. This isn't a typical argument. 

He's thinking about Khan. 

Jim sighs. “You’re right, Spock,” he admits. “I'm sorry.” 

Bones throws them both a bemused look and stomps ahead into the desert. “Jesus,” he mumbles, “it was just a flower.” 

***

Captain’s log. Some members of the crew have been infected by a virus of unknown origins which seems to reduce or destroy inhibitions. The method of transmission is simple contact, so we are advising - [The recording is here interrupted by an unidentified voice shouting “en grade!” and a clatter of what appear to be swords. The recording ends there.]

There was something Jim was supposed to be doing, he remembers in the back of his mind. Something to do with the operations of the ship. But there was a fog pressing darkly on his mind, and he couldn't remember why it was his responsibility, why he had ever wanted to do it. 

What was the point? he asks himself. It will never really be his ship. This will never really be his life. 

“Leave me alone, Mr. Spock,” he says bitterly. “What would you know about how I feel?” 

Spock steps cautiously towards him. “How are you feeling, captain?” 

Captain. God, he hates the way that sounds sometimes, or he hates it and loves it in equal measure, especially from Spock.

Spock is very close to him - he's pointing a phaser at him, but still. 

He's beautiful, Jim thinks, and he can never tell him. He can never know. 

Spock takes a step back from him, and only then does Jim realize he's been leaning forward. 

“Captain, I realize that your state of mind is altered at present, but please listen to me. The virus is transmitted through touch…” 

The virus. He remembers that. The virus caused uncontrollable emotions, loss of rational thinking - someone was singing an old Irish folk song, and Sulu was running through the hallways with a sword, and Bones said that the virus was transmitted through touch. 

Spock was still talking, but Jim couldn't quite focus on what he was saying. Uncontrollable emotion, he thinks, transmitted through touch.

If he could just know… 

“Captain, would you please follow me to the infirmary?” Spock says. 

Jim suddenly feels very confident that Spock isn't going to pull the trigger. He wants… he just wants to know. 

He reaches out and softly closes his fingers around Spock’s wrist. 

Spock looks at him with wide, shocked eyes, and seconds later his phaser clatters to the floor. 

“Captain…. ?” he says, half as a question, and his eyes are different now. 

“It's alright,” Jim says. “How do you feel?” 

Spock takes a deep, shuddering breath. “Strange,” he says, and takes a step forward. 

Jim grins in triumph as Spock kisses him. 

It's desperate, a hard and fast collision, and Spock throws his whole body into it, hands curling into Jim’s shirt. He makes frustrated noise against Jim’s mouth. Jim wraps an arm around his waist, holds him close, as close as he can. 

There’s a reason he shouldn't be doing this, there is, but it's far away, and all he can feel is Spock, all over him, trying to touch him everywhere at once. 

He breaks away from the kiss for a moment and smiles, broad and genuine. 

“Jim,” he says, “you are… amazing.” 

Then they're kissing again, and Jim wishes it could be like this forever, the two of them lost in this fog, but he knows it can't, because… why can't it… 

The door to his cabin opens with a bang, and he hears Bones’ voice.

“Oh, God damn it.” 

And then there's a sharp pain in his neck, and everything is dark. 

***  
Bones leaves them in the infirmary after administering the antidote, arming himself with half a dozen syringes to track down the rest of the crew. 

On the other side of the room, Chekov is apparently recovering much more slowly, and is bombarding the nurse bending over him with the history of the Soviet Union. 

Spock sits on the edge of the bed next to Jim’s, tapping his fingers nervously on the bed frame. 

Jim considers sitting up but settles for staring at the ceiling, desolately hoping that either Spock will go away or this was turn out to have not actually happened. 

When Jim closes his eyes, he sees his hand reaching for Spock’s wrist, an intentional transmission of the virus without even knowing what it would do to him. He can feel the guilt like a weight on his chest. 

“It will be easier,” Spock says, “if we do not discuss it.” 

Jim turns his face towards the wall, hating himself. 

“I think we can agree on that,” he says. 

It already seemed like a distant dream, what had happened that short time ago. However that virus had worked, Spock couldn't have wanted to do that - would never have willingly done that. 

“It is important that our working relationship continue as normal,” Spock says. “Captain -”

“Spock, can we please just not talk about it?” Jim pleads. “If you want to just move on, then move on.” 

Spock falls silent, and Jim can't turn around, can't look at him. There is nothing more humiliating than this feeling. 

“I apologize,” Spock says. “Neither of us were in our right minds. I understand that your actions did not reflect your genuine emotions.” 

Jim hopes fervently that that the forces of the universe will align in his favor for once and some freak accident will transport him across the galaxy, or he’ll be sucked into a highly specific black hole. 

“Right,” he says instead, and closes his eyes until he hears the faint sound of Spock walking away. 

***

It's impossible to talk to him, after that. 

If he thought Spock was emotionally closed off before, well, he hadn't seen anything yet. Even by Vulcan standards, he could reach a master class in it. He avoids even looking Jim in the eye. 

There's no way out of this, Jim realizes, except distance. He's been letting this wound bleed for too long. It's not going to stop unless he stops it. 

He doesn't tell anyone he's thinking about leaving the Enterprise. Saying it would make it real, and there's a part of him that thinks he must be insane to consider it, to think about giving up the only thing that's ever made him feel like a whole person. Maybe it would be the worst decision he's ever made. 

He doesn't tell Bones, because he would be so good about it, would tell Jim that he's doing the right thing and might even offer to come with him. And Jim could never ask him to give up what is, despite what he'd say, the best job he's ever had. 

(And, he thinks guiltily, maybe he doesn't want to be told it's the right thing.) 

He wants to tell Spock even less. 

What would be worse, for him to accept it as if it didn't matter or for him to ask Jim not to go? 

In their other life, Spock was never a ship's captain; maybe he should be. Maybe the ambassador was wrong, and what they really deserve is a chance to live without each other. 

***

Jim saves Yorktown, and Spock saves him, again. It's becoming a pattern, and even minutes after another encounter with certain death, bleeding profusely and half in shock, Jim knows it's one he won't be able to break.

When Spock reaches out and pulls him into the shuttle, Jim knows there's no question of leaving. Whatever this is, he can't let go of it, and it's going to have to be enough. 

Still, despite all that, he’s still a little surprised when Spock shows up for his party. 

It's a good party; he can't remember having a birthday like that before, really surrounded by people he cares about. He hasn't ever cared about this many people before. 

At the end of the night, there's only a few of them left, and it's another surprise when Spock is one of them. He lingers at the edge of conversations, looking faintly amused when people make jokes, but most of the time Jim can't help noticing he looks like he has something to say. 

“Well,” Bones says, getting to his feet, “I think it's about time that I get going.” 

“Aye,” Scotty says, leaping up immediately, “I think I should as well. Come along, Jaylah.” 

“What?” From behind a pile of shot glasses, Jayluh looks startled. “Why are we leaving? I was having fun.” 

Scotty laughs. “I've got whiskey at home, lassie, let’s go.” 

The three leave together, Jayluh grumbling faintly under her breath, and Bones turns around and grins broadly at Jim. 

The two of them stand there alone, looking at each other, and Jim laughs. “I think they did that on purpose, yeah?” 

“I believe we are intended to speak with each other privately,” Spock says. 

Jim smiles wryly. “No pressure.” 

"I have something for you," Spock says abruptly. “Would you accompany me back to my quarters?” 

Jim’s heartbeat quickens at that, and he hates it. “Yeah, okay,” he says. “But you really didn't have to get me anything.” 

He follows Spock back through the hallways of Starfleet headquarters, trying to imagine what a Vulcan might possibly get someone for a birthday present. Other than a tracking device, apparently. 

Spock’s assigned temporary housing is, as Jim might have expected, sparse. Spartan, even. It's dark, too, and a little warmer than would be comfortable for a human. Jim casts his eyes around for something out of place or something, well, human, a stray sock or some of the product he must use in his hair. There's nothing. 

Spock crosses to his mostly bare desk and retrieves a book, which he holds out to Jim in an awkward, jerky gesture. “It is a first edition,” he says. 

“A Tale of Two Cities.” Jim can't say he has any particular fondness for Dickens, but the gesture means more than he could possibly say. “Spock - thank you.” 

"Dr. McCoy informed me that you enjoy antique books. He assured me that he was not joking," Spock adds, sounding as if he didn't quite believe it. 

"No, he - I do." Jim opens the book to the first page. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. A little on the nose, isn't it?" he jokes. 

He realizes it was the wrong thing to say immediately - Spock's eyebrows fly upwards in the way that means he's horrified. "No, I'm sorry," Jim says hurriedly. "I know you didn't mean - it's a great gift, Spock. Thank you." 

"I hoped you would like it," Spock says, quietly. 

The silence falls then - the horrible, awkward silence that seems to follow them everywhere. Sometimes it seems insurmountable, like everything will always be difficult with them, and Jim hates it, longs for the ability to know what Spock is thinking and to know the right thing to say. 

"I thought you'd be with Uhura," Jim says, which isn't the right thing at all, but is what he's been thinking in the back of his mind since the moment he realized they were alone. She’d left the party early; he couldn't remember if she’d said goodbye to Spock. 

Spock, very quietly, sighs. "Nyota and I - I believe it is too late for our relationship to return to what it once was." 

"Wait, too late?" Jim suddenly feels like there's a large part of this conversation that's soaring directly over his head. "Did something happen?" 

Spock clearly finds the topic of conversation painful, which of course is only fair, and Jim should tell him he doesn't have to talk about it, that it's personal, but he can't quite ignore the feeling that the ground has shifted beneath him suddenly, that something important has changed. It's guilty and bitter and he pushes it aside. He's just being a good friend, that's all. That has to be all. 

"I considered leaving Starfleet," Spock says, avoiding his eyes. "I wanted to assist in the colonization efforts on New Vulcan. I - I did not ask Nyota. I simply told her I was leaving. She did not appreciate that." 

It truly feels like the ground is shifting then, or maybe like the ground has opened up and swallowed him whole. He was going to leave. Jim knows with a sick certainty that it can only be his fault. 

"But she's still wearing your mother's necklace," he says blankly. 

"We are important to one another," Spock says. "The nature of relationships changes over one's lifetime, that is only to be expected." 

He's perfectly calm, perfectly guarded, and Jim feels totally adrift. 

"You were going to leave?" he says, wondering if he might have somehow misunderstood. 

"I decided against it," Spock repeats. 

"But if you're not leaving Starfleet," Jim protests. "There's no reason you can't-" 

The look that crosses Spock's face for a moment is dark, almost angry, and then it's gone. "How many times should a person tolerate the knowledge that she is not... first. In her partner's priorities. Cannot be." 

"And what is? Vulcan?" 

Spock doesn't respond for a moment. Jim can still see the anger in his eyes, and realizes this time that it's directed at himself. "I cannot change what I am," he says. "Nyota has never asked me to. She still would not. She merely informed me that we both deserve more." 

The quiet that settles over them feels oppressive, and Jim senses that there's a great deal Spock hasn't said, can't say. He wants, again, to offer Spock his hand, and tell him, it's all right. Just show me. 

"Spock," he says eventually. "Don't take this the wrong way. But I've known you for a few years now, and I think most of the time you're not that happy." 

Spock looks up at him, surprised, maybe a little offended. "Happiness is-" 

"Illogical, I know," Jim interrupts. "But all I'm saying is, you know. It's not bad for people to help each other change." 

"The past few years have changed me considerably, Jim." 

"Me too," Jim says quickly, fighting down the burst of absurd happiness and pride that he feels whenever Spock uses his first name. "I wouldn't be the same person without you." 

Too much, he knows instantly. Of course, it is - he is - too much. 

"You don't have to answer this," he says, "but why now? Three years - why did you decide now to leave?" 

Spock stares fixedly at a point just over his shoulder. "Thank you for speaking to me about this matter," he says, as if he hadn't heard. "But it is late. I believe you should go." 

And then, quietly, less formally, in that tone that always makes hope drive its talons deeper into Jim's heart - "Happy birthday, Jim." 

***

Ambassador Spock's grave is on New Vulcan, alone - there is no individual marker for Amanda, just a monument in the center of a new city. It would be illogical, Sarek says, to fill an new planet with shrines to what is lost. 

But they buried the ambassador, and Jim doesn't know if that's what he would have wanted. Proper Starfleet procedure would be a burial in space, but maybe this is better - to be grounded. 

Sarek didn't ask what Jim was doing here, unaccompanied, and Jim doesn't want to know what he might think. He's not sticking around on New Vulcan, which has to be the most depressing place he's ever been, a planet full of grim-faced people and half-finished construction projects. He just wanted to see it for himself.

"You should have told me," he says softly, out loud, looking at the stone marker. It's just a name, dates, a list of accomplishments. No inscription, no family. "You shouldn't have been alone." 

He's half expecting an answer in his head, but there's nothing. Just him. 

It's not his grief or his universe or his Spock. But it's something. There was a world that Nero erased, wiped out like he had Vulcan, and it meant something, and now the faint echoes in Jim's head are all that's left of it. 

Jim presses his hand against the cold stone, makes himself form the Vulcan salute. They listed the ambassador's dates of birth and death the only way they could, but it makes him seem much too young. The same age as Spock. 

Live long and prosper, Jim thinks. Please. 

***

Bones drags him on a tour of the Enterprise's new medical facilities, updated and with new equipment to provide for the needs of a dozen new species. 

"Wouldn't have thought you'd be so enthusiastic about more aliens," Jim says. 

Bones laughs. "Not aliens I object to. Just Vulcans."

 

Jim looks around at the gleaming new fixtures of the ship and feels a strange sense of sorrow. It's never the same, when they rebuild the Enterprise; that's true of his life and his echoing memories. It might be better, but it's never the same.

He turns around on the pretext of examining some new syringes, so he doesn't have to look Bones in the eyes. 

“I applied for the vice admiralty job on Yorktown,” Jim says. “You know… wanted to see if I could get it.” 

“Did you?” Bones asks, sounding wary. 

“Yeah. But I'm not leaving. I was never going to really take it.” 

Bones laughs incredulously. He crosses the room to Jim and stands directly in front of him, arms crossed across his chest. 

“Jim,” he says quietly, “I might not know the precise numbers, but I know there’s too damned many planets in our galaxy, and too damned many galaxies in the universe. And in all of them, I would bet there's not more than a handful of other people or aliens or energy beings made of light who could do the job you've done.” 

Jim laughs, but Bones’ eyes are serious. “Don't give it up,” he says. 

He always knows when Jim is lying. Terrible idea, making friends with people who can tell. 

“I won’t,” Jim promises. “I'm not giving all this up.” 

***

 

He doesn't see much of Spock in the days leading up to the Enterprise’s relaunch. He tries not to worry that Spock has spilled away and decided to go back to Vulcan after all, to believe that he’ll see him on the bridge again. 

The day before the launch, though, there's a knock on the door. 

When he opens the door and Spock is standing there, it's an immediate relief. 

“Uh, hi,” Jim says. When Spock doesn’t immediately respond, he just gets out of the way and says “Come in.” He gestures vaguely towards the kitchen chairs, more or less the only convenient place to sit down in his small Starfleet quarters. 

Spock doesn't sit down, though. Instead, he immediately starts pacing. 

Jim’s seen him do it before, on the bridge, but never without talking. It's disconcerting. 

“Hey. Um. Do you want to tell me what's wrong?” 

Spock stops abruptly. 

“I received a communication from the government of New Vulcan, informing me of what roles would be available to me in the colony.” 

The colony. That thought has been bothering Jim. He thinks of Spock spending the rest of his life on New Vulcan, blending into that crowd of blank, severe faces. Keeping his head down, married to some Vulcan woman, teaching his Vulcan children not to smile and not to cry, leaving behind Starfleet to write out equations in a lab. Hiding away his anger, his pain, even that bright flash of happiness in his eyes when he executes a new chess move or discovers some fascinating new species - everything that makes him Spock. 

It's wrong. It's unacceptable. 

Jim looks at Spock, whose hands are both balled into tight fists, white-knuckled. “So what did they say?” he asks. 

“I would be accepted on New Vulcan as a worker and valued scientist,” Spock says in a clipped tone, as if reciting from memory. “Out of concern for the health of Vulcan society, however, interspecies relationships marriage and reproduction are now formally discouraged.” 

It’s typically Vulcan, which is typically infuriating. 

“And what exactly does that mean?” 

"Logic would dictate," Spock says, "that as their are so few Vulcans left, they should be discouraged from relationships and reproduction with members of other species. Apparently I fall into that category." 

 

Spock is attempting to stand in dignified military posture, shoulders straight, but Jim can see the anger running through his whole body. He wants to reach out, to put a hand on his shoulder. He shouldn't. 

“I'm sorry, Spock,” he says. “But is that really what you wanted? I mean, who gives a damn about those people?” 

Spock exhales slowly. 

"I do not understand why Ambassador Spock would devote the last years of his life to a society that viewed us as outsiders," he admits. "The continuation of Vulcan culture is an invaluable project, but he seemed much more -" 

"Human?" Jim suggests. 

"I would have said independent," Spock responds drily. 

 

Jim remembers the echos in Ambassador Spock’s head. His strongest impression of Vulcan had been of kneeling in the sand, nearing the end of some ritual, before a voice told him “there are no answers for you here”. 

His answers, Spock’s memories had made clear, were on the Enterprise. With Admiral Kirk. 

"Well, he didn't have much else to go back to," Jim says. "Maybe he went to New Vulcan so you wouldn't feel like you had to." 

Spock, looking distant, doesn't respond. 

"I know he wouldn't have wanted you to leave Starfleet," Jim presses on. "I mean, it's your life. But he would have wanted you to stay." 

"He understood better than I did," Spock says bitterly. "That I am not Vulcan. I never was." 

"No," Jim says defensively, "you're more than that." 

 

Spock stands with his hands behind his back and looks at him with searching eyes. “Jim,” he says, “the things you say -” 

“Only because I mean them,” Jim says fervently, and doesn’t look away from him.

Then Spock is stepping forward, hesitantly, and reaching out for Jim’s hand. He winds their fingers together slowly, and Jim lets him, sitting frozen in worry that he’ll scare Spock away. He’s so close, just a few inches away, and Jim can see his faint freckles, and almost helpless look in his eyes. 

“Spock -” he starts to say, and then Spock leans down and kisses him, softly, just the slightest contact. 

It feels electric, like the kind of shock that could restart your heart. It lacks only for a few seconds, and then it’s over, and he’s gone. 

Spock backs away and practically falls into the chair next to him, clutching the arms of it hard. 

Jim can’t help feeling a jolt of bitter triumph. This is real, he thinks, staring at Spock, searching his face for a sign of what to do next. This is not just me. 

"It feels different," Spock says, sounding miserable about it. "Why does it feel different? It's not... not safe." 

"I'm not sure it's supposed to be safe," Jim says. "I mean, it gets safer. But initially..." 

Spock closes his eyes, shakes his head. "I should not..." 

Jim doesn’t know what to say in response. This is a situation that calls for delicate diplomacy, and that’s not his strongest suit. 

He can’t just walk away from this. 

“Listen, I have to tell you,” he says. “I thought about leaving. I was offered a job on Yorktown.” 

“Captain?” Spock’s head snaps up immediately, and he sounds as if he thinks he’s misheard. “You considered leaving the Enterprise?” 

“I recommended you for the job.” Jim sits down heavily in his kitchen chair. “I told the admiralty you’d be a great captain. Better without me, maybe.” 

“I would not,” Spock interrupts fiercely. “You are irreplaceable.” 

Jim smiles slightly.

“Don't you get it,” he sighs, “it was because I could hardly stand to be around you. To look at you every day and know what I’d done and what you must think of me.” 

Spock’s eyes are confused. “I never thought any less of you,” he says. “If anything, you should have thought -” 

He breaks off and swallows hard, clearly willing himself not to say it. 

Jim feels it again, that terrible rush of hope. 

“Spock. Please look at me, Spock.” 

“I am the one who kissed you,” Spock says, barely above a whisper, addressing the floor. “When I should not have wanted to. When I should have resisted. I could not control myself.” 

He looks like it hurts just to talk about it, and Jim reaches out and and covers Spock’s hand with his own. It's reassuring when Spock doesn't throw him off immediately. 

“Spock,” he says again, “please look at me.” 

He does, and his eyes are so completely lost that the only thing Jim can think to do is just say it. 

If there's one thing he’s always been good at it, it's talking. 

“I'm laying all my cards on the table here, all right? This is what I want, this is how we’re supposed to be, and we both know it, don't we?” 

Spock sits completely still, and Jim thinks he knows what that means now. That he's holding himself back, willing himself not to move. 

“We’re not going to be able to talk ourselves out of it and it's not going to go away. I've waited for it to go away. Can we - can we try, at least?” 

There’s no question of what they’re talking about anymore, he hopes. They understand each other as well as they’re ever likely to. 

“Do you know what you're asking?” Spock says. 

“I wish you'd tell me,” Jim says. 

Spock doesn't say it. Spock doesn't say anything, and Jim suddenly feels very tired. 

“We have to be back on the ship tomorrow,” he says. “I can't do this.” 

“I should not ask you to.” Spock sighs. “I should request a transfer.” 

“Please don't,” Jim says. 

He doesn't reply. 

“I'll see you on the bridge tomorrow,” Jim says, trying to infuse his voice with conviction. “Goodnight, Spock.” 

***  
He is on the bridge the next day, to Jim’s enormous relief. When he passes the science station, Spock catches his eye and smiles slightly, and that means that they're already on better footing than Jim was hoping for. 

Proceedings for the relaunch are standard, as they generally are in between disasters. Spock stays at his own station, mostly silent, until shift changes and he slips into the elevator, alone, with a terse, “goodnight, captain.” 

Jim can feel the bridge crew’s eyes on him - particularly Uhura, though he might be imagining that. “Well, everything seems to be in order,” he says loudly to no one in particular. “Excellent work, team. Mr. Sulu, you have the con.” 

He goes back to his own quarters at first, making an effort not to look anyone in the eye who might stop him and try to have a conversation. 

He glances around his mostly empty living space, considering the sparseness that surrounds him. He knows what's missing, if he's being honest with himself. He always knew. 

Jim pours himself a drink of whiskey and takes one sip. 

He knows why he's doing this alone. He knows what he's avoiding. 

Don't be a coward, Kirk, he tells himself.

Spock’s quarters are right down the hall, and he answers as soon as Jim knocks - almost, Jim thinks, as though he’d been waiting. 

“Hello,” Spock says uncertainly, and leaves it there.

“Hi.” Jim leans on the doorframe in a manner he hopes is charming and casual. "I was wondering if I could take you somewhere." 

 

Spock blinks at him. 

"Jim, we are on a starship." 

Jim. Another tiny victory. "We are," he says, "and as a captain with certain connections I happen to have access to the latest in virtual reality technology. Don't even have to leave your quarters.” 

Spock's expression remains skeptical, but he opens the door a little further. "Come in."

Jim grins and saunters in. 

Spock’s quarters aren't exactly sparse, but they are definitely dark, and slightly warmer than the rest of the ship, mostly in various shades of dark red. There are, somewhat alarmingly, several Vulcan weapons hanging on the walls. 

“So you are taking me somewhere virtually?” he says as he watches Jim set up the equipment.

“Yeah,” Jim says, and perches without asking on some kind of Vulcan velvet bench. “Come on, sit.” 

A moment later and the blackness of space surrounds them. 

“Home sweet home,” Jim laughs. “This is the view from its moon.” The program revolves around them, the solar system spinning on its axis. “If you want to see anything, all you have to do is reach out and touch it.” 

Spock’s hand extends into the blackness and closes around Saturn, and then they’re spinning in its orbit, just outside of its rings. “Fascinating,” he says, in a voice that means ‘beautiful’. “The scientific implications are endless.” 

“Well, I know you've seen it all before,” Jim says, “but it's one of the first programs they made. Wanna see the whole galaxy?” 

Spock nods, and Jim zooms out with a motion of his hands until they're at the center of the Milky Way, stars and planets dancing around them. And it's beautiful, every detail there in precision and clarity. Jim looks at Spock, and his eyes are darting in every direction, trying to take it all in at once. And there's nothing Jim wants to look at more than him. 

“It is certainly different than the perspective on a viewing screen,” Spock says, a little breathlessly. 

“I can show you anything you want,” Jim says, “anything Starfleet’s ever charged. Even lost planets.” 

“How far out does it go?” Spock says. 

“I can show you the whole known universe,” Jim says, and he does. 

At that distance, it is a little bit less clear, every galaxy just a point of light in a night sky. Spock reaches out almost instinctively and finds his own home star cluster. The Eridanus constellation flickers across their field of vision, and then they're in the triple star system that Vulcan used to orbit, and any moment the planet’s rotation will bring it into view. 

“Go back to Earth,” Spock says to Jim, and the program obeys him automatically, bringing them back to the moon’s surface. 

“Sixteen light years away.” Spock says it almost to himself, eyes fixed on the planet’s surface. 

He turns back to Jim. He’d half expected Spock to be upset, but he seems calm, more so than before, Jim thinks. “Thank you for showing me. It is a promising technology.” 

“Beautiful place, isn't it?” 

“It is amazing,” Spock says, with what could be a touch of emotion, “that it is our responsibility to make that map larger.” 

“Best job in the world,” Jim says lightly. 

“Do you subscribe to the theory that the universe is expanding?” Spock asks abruptly. 

Jim shrugs. It's one of those things he’s never put in the time to calculate or study independently - what does it matter to him if the universe is getting larger on a time frame so slow it could never affect current sentient life? “It could be,” he says. “I mean, I know it's scientifically plausible.” 

“I find it somewhat - comforting,” Spock says, “to think that there will always be new places for future intelligences to explore.” 

Jim glances down and sees Spock’s hand hovering just next to his. “Yeah, but everything getting further away from everything else all the time?” he says. “Kind of a miracle any of us find each other at all.” 

“That is another perspective,” Spock says, and falls silent again. 

Jim deliberately doesn't reach for his hand. 

“Wanna go anywhere else?” he says instead. 

It's a relief, though, when Spock says, “Could you turn it off, please?” 

The program obeys that command too, and they're back in the limited space of the Enterprise, surrounded by the four walls that prevent them from losing gravity, from floating off into space. 

“I told you once about Vulcan marriage customs,” Spock says, staring straight ahead into the distance. “I was betrothed when I was seven years old. Her name was T’Pring. She did not survive the destruction of Vulcan.” 

“I'm sorry,” Jim says, trying to keep up with the abrupt change in subject. 

Spock nods slightly. “Our relationship was never romantic. It was understood that neither of us owed each other that kind of loyalty. However, as a child, she was… as close to a friend as I had.” 

He doesn't seem to expect a reply, and in fact staring ahead and not looking at Jim seems to be the only way he can say this. 

“She had a lover on Vulcan, and I believe I subconsciously wanted to show her that I could achieve the same. A relationship. When I met Nyota, we became close friends, and she wanted to be more than that. I was… willing.” 

Jim hopes that if this is building to a revelation of some kind, it’s not going to turn out to be that Spock and Uhura are back together. He doesn’t say anything.” 

“My father had a very Vulcan marriage with a human woman,” Spock says. “I believed that I could have the same. Nyota is an intelligent and logical woman and she never objected to the way I approached our relationship. She was not the person a Vulcan would be expected to chose as a spouse. But she was not… she was not unacceptable to my image of myself.” 

It’s not hard to read between the lines of that one. She’s not unacceptable, but Jim is. 

“It was always easier for me,” Spock says, “not to interrogate the way I felt. I did not understand what romantic love should feel like. We do not discuss it.” He looks more uncomfortable than ever and has to force out the next words. “When I met you, I was forced to consider it. And I understood why I did not feel more deeply for T’Pring or Nyota.” 

Oh, Jim thinks, and then wonders why it wasn’t obvious before. 

“On Vulcan, attraction is far from a necessary component of a marriage. Humans do not want that kind of relationship,” he says. “And I do not believe I want it either, anymore.” 

Jim has to stifle a smile. “Spock,” he says, “are you coming out to me?” 

“I understand it must seem trivial to you.” He finally turns hesitantly to meet Jim’s eyes. “By human standards, it is. I simply wanted to be honest with you.” 

“It doesn't seem trivial at all.” They’re still not touching, but Jim hopes what he’s saying is comforting enough. “Earth had the same prejudices once. If it’s important to you, then it’s important.” 

Spock smiles very faintly. “Thank you for listening.” 

“Thank you for telling me.” 

The silence between them doesn’t seem so uncomfortable this time. 

“What am I going to do,” he says, “the next time you are hurt? The next time you endanger yourself in some reckless plan? It is already difficult enough, Jim. To believe I might lose you again.” 

“You won’t lose me,” Jim says. “Seems like I never get hurt permanently when you’re around.” 

Spock moves just slightly closer, close enough for their shoulders to brush together. “You have done the same for me. We are a good team. We are better together.” 

Jim lets himself lean in. “Are you trying to talk yourself into something?” he says, half-joking. 

In response, Spock reaches for his hand. Jim’s instinct is to hold on tight, but Spock gently rearranges his fingers into a kind of gesture, only two of them pointing up. He makes the same gesture and touches their fingertips lightly together. 

Jim doesn’t know how he’s supposed to respond, but it feels so much more monumental than it should, like a kind of vow. Neither of them move an inch for a long moment. Jim thinks he would stay here touching this tiny area of skin forever. 

“This is a Vulcan kiss,” Spock says. “I want…. I want to try.” 

Jim grins at him. “I’d like that.” 

***  
“Sorry if this is like asking you to get married on the first date,” Jim says, “but could we do the mind melding thing sometime?” 

He’s not used to this yet - being together in his quarters, which seems far less empty now, being allowed to kiss Spock and to touch his hands, even to look at him and know that it’s all right to look. But he can’t stop thinking about what it would be like to know, really know, what his version of Spock is thinking. 

“I am not sure you would want to experience my thoughts,” Spock says. “They are… difficult.” 

“Mine aren't so easy themselves,” he says, trailing his fingers lightly down Spock’s wrist. He can feel him shiver slightly. “I’d like to see yours, though. I don't think I’d mind them.” 

Spock raises an eyebrow, sharp and perceptive. “You engaged thoughts with my counterpart, am I correct?” 

“I'm impressed,” Jim says. “How’d you know?” 

Spock uncurls his hand from Jim’s and presses them flat together, palm to palm. It's started to feel almost like a human kiss; emotional transference, Jim thinks. “You were always a little too perceptive,” he says archly. “And my father told me you visited his grave.” 

“Well, you have an unfair disadvantage, then,” Jim says. “I've seen at least a version of your mind. You don't know anything about mine.” 

Spock leans forward and kisses him lightly on the temple. “I know some things,” he says, and extends a hand towards Jim. “Come here.”

He leans forward, and the touch of Spock’s warm fingers against his foreward feels like it's setting off sparks. 

“My mind to your mind,” he says. “My thoughts to your thoughts.” 

It's just as abrupt as the last time - one minute he’s alone in his head, the next moment some other conscious is occupying the same space, twisting its thought around his. Except this isn't a strange mind, it's Spock’s, his Spock’s, which he prides himself on already knowing pretty well. 

The first thing he feels strongly is Spock’s own shock at the meld, the strength of the connection. He feels Spock take stock of his emotions, feels Spock’s surprise at Jim’s lack of resistance or hesitation. And he feels something else, too, overwhelmingly. He knows it because he's felt it before. 

Spock just looks at him, eyes locked on his, and Jim thinks, I love you. 

He can feel Spock’s thoughts try to form the right words, how difficult it is for him, and he realizes Spock’s thinking in Vulcan and he somehow understands it perfectly. T’hy’la, Spock thinks, and Jim knows exactly what means.  
“I didn’t know,” Spock says, “how long you had - felt like this.” 

“It was worth the wait,” Jim says, twining their fingers back together.

He can feel the darker threads in Spock’s mind, too, the shame and embarrassment and pain, and he tries to treat it the way everyone's always telling him to treat emotional wounds: not to bury it deeper down but to feel it, acknowledge it, and drown it out with better feelings. This is alright, he tells that part of Spock’s mind. Don't you feel how right this is? 

Yes, Spock’s mind answers back. 

“Your mind’s all right,” Jim says, grinning. “Don't know what you were so worried about.” 

“Yours is beautiful,” Spock says fervently, and Jim leans in to kiss him again.


End file.
